http://www.seeing.org/visiontd/articles/index.

html

 
Why haven't I heard of this before ?
 

Natural Vision Training and the Bates Method have been attacked, threatened and
 
ridiculed by the vision care professionals for over seventy-five years. Even today
there are new reports that come out strongly against the whole idea that it is
  possible to regain your eyesight through vision training.
  It is universally accepted that to become a good athlete you need to train your
body. Nobody expects to be able to win a race without adequate training. Olympic
quality sports require not only physical but mental training in order to even qualify
for the team. To maintain good health, you need to pay attention to your diet,
exercise regularly as well as maintaining a positive attitude.

Vision training is not a mystery; it is common sense that by maintaining good

vision habits, you are likely to keep your vision for your entire life. Most people
know of people having perfect near and far vision well into their 90's. Vision
training is about getting back to the strategies that are known to maintain the
natural clear vision.

Today, during the final years of the 20th century, we have come to a point where
there is room for diversity and the interest in alternative therapies have never been
stronger. Vision training offers an effective and inexpensive way to regain natural
clear vision and how to maintain this for the rest of ones life.
 
In the preface to "Eye Education by Bates
Method", Margaret Corbett, who studied with
William Bates, wrote:

  The development of civilization is a series of conflicts, some consisting

of ward, but most of them arising from a clash of ideas. Those who
cling to the outworn thoughts and antiquated methods forward have
opposed each step, and progress has been slow. Fortunately, the
retarding of the tempo of progress has not been wholly detrimental.
http://www.seeing.org/visiontd/articles/index.html

For a new idea to be accepted, it must first be tested in the searing

fires of criticism, ridicule and invective. To survive these ordeals, the
new idea must be correct, as the fallacious and unsound ones are
destroyed by the attacks made upon them.

So it has been with the Bates system of eye education. Through it

was developed through long and sound research, it was
nevertheless novel… and when it was presented to the public, it
immediately met with the opposite of those who believed that if
glasses were good enough for their forefathers, they are good
enough for us. Some of this antagonism was sincere and came
from those who were still unconvinced that Dr Bates discoveries
would benefit mankind. Some of the attacks undoubtedly were
inspired by less admirable reasons.

Regardless of the motives activating those opposing us, they were

energetic in their assaults and soon we were being set upon from
all sides. The hostilities grew in intensity and finally culminated
in criminal procession. To the actual observer it appeared to be
charged against me, but actually not only was I on trial, but also
the entire system of eye education, developed by Dr Bates. Facing
the criminal charges was a bitter ordeal, but since our cause was
just and our system of eye education meritorious, we prevailed.
The jury found me not guilty of practicing medicine or optometry.

In 1943, George A Posner wrote about Corbett's

trial "Are Eye Glasses à Racket…?" In SRI
magazine (August 1943)

  They took her to court, all right, but try as they might, they could not
obtain a conviction. And why? Because the charge was merely a sham.
A cover-up of the good doctor's attempt to restrain Mrs Corbett from …
teaching a certain method of eye education of proven success, because
they had decreed it was verboten!

Why were the doctors up in arms about his so-called "pernicious

activity?" Because of complaints of persons injured or defrauded
by the defendant? Not at all!

Three hundred witnesses clamored for the privilege of testifying.

They thronged into the courtroom, told of the healing of
practically every eye disorder known to ophthalmologic
practice…without the use of medicine or the wearing of glasses!
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They ranged in age from four to 84; they sat for days in the
anteroom of the court waiting for a chance to "have their say"…

(Aldous Huxley's testimony received special attention, as he

demonstrated he could read without glasses though he had been
totally blind in one eye and only had 20% sight in the other before
taking lessons from Corbett. In two months he was reading
without glasses).

No one iota of adverse testimony was uncovered or proven.

Although the doctors had used every endeavor, even to the
sending of two female spies to take Mrs. Corbett's purported
"treatments" for the sake of gathering evidence, they weren't able
to prove a single instance where "medical practice" could be
proven. Nor could anyone be found who considered himself
injured or defrauded. In fact, the female spies were found in the
side-room during the trial, practicing some of Mrs. Corbett's eye
techniques!

The court had no alternative but to dismiss the case against Mrs.
Margaret Darst Corbett. And the publicity of it served her well. A
number of the jurors and many of the spectators signed up for
Mrs. Corbett's course.

The Los Angeles trial revealed that there had been similar
prosecutions of adherents of this new teaching throughout the
country (USA) over a period of years.

For over 30 years organized medicine has fought with every

possible means to keep the news of this revolutionary discovery
from the world!

Janet Goodrich, Ph.D., in discussing possible

reasons why many people have not heard of the
Bates Method, writes in her book Natural Visions
Improvement:

  …the professional, technically trained eye practitionners… were taught

that the Bates Method was ineffective, to be derided and disdained.
Margaret Corbett admonished the hundreds of teachers she trained in
the 1940's and the 1950's never to advertise, lecture or publish
articles… More understanding is generated by the knowledge that she
http://www.seeing.org/visiontd/articles/index.html

was arrested (and acquitted) twice for practicing optometry without a

license…
In 1974, my colleague in San Francisco, Ms Anna Kaye, who'd been
quietly transmitting Bates method principles for several decades, was
visited by undercover agents. She was told she was breaking the law on
sixteen counts…

You may now realize why substantiated object proof is scarce.

Janet Goodrich, Ph.D. Natural Vision improvement

(Berkeley, California: Celestrial Arts, 1985 p.184-185)

     
       
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